Hi Folks, this is your friendly “local” BA Business undergrad, reporting live this month from her new and improved pad overlooking Tokyo Bay!

It was much easier to study and focus on the PC screen when all I had to look at out of the window from the last place was a big wall of brown concrete, concrete and more concrete! From our new lounge, I am also looking out at concrete (this is Tokyo after all!) but THIS concrete is MUCH prettier, being the Rainbow Bridge, Tokyo Skyline, and Odaiba (recreation area). I can also see patches of sky now, which is always a bonus when you are trying to live like a normal human being, and – best of all – water!!! Now, granted this is the kind of water that has fluorescent green fish with 3 eyes and no fins swimming around in it, but even toxic waste sparkles in the sunshine, and as long as I don’t actually look down (around 20 or 30 metres to the ground) I can sit here and type – or not type as it happens because the view is SO much better than before!

Yes, we have moved, the hole in my stomach is only slightly larger than before, and I am still on target to finish my degree before it perforates! Life is good!

So, as I sit and type I am starting to think about the subject of my final assessment on Project Management which was released late last week. As expected, it is along the lines of “talk about a project you have experience of” and one particular one that springs to mind, and the one I will probably end up writing about, involved implementing some software to do shopping basket analysis in my former life as a systems analyst. Unfortunately, the project was a dismal failure! Whilst this isn’t going to make for pleasant reading, it certainly gives me plenty to write about! I’m going to need to explain the project background, talk about the theory of project management, and how it relates to the actual practice, and finally produce a lessons learned-type section, which unfortunately only accounts for 15% of the marks because it is here that I think I can score serious points based on the whole experience!

Taking off a little pressure

Given that we have just moved, it is summer time now and relentlessly hot in Tokyo, and that my daughter has just started her new school and my two sons daily commute to daycare has suddenly extended from 2 minutes to about 20 minutes (every silver lining has a big cloud attached to it, right?!) I have decided – most uncharacteristically for me – to – I can’t believe I am going to say this out loud – take the pressure off myself.  You know, I deserve a break, I really do! 8 years here, 3 kids, no pain meds (yep, STILL harping on about that old chestnut!) a Japanese husband (if you were married to one you would understand. Actually scratch that, if you are married full stop you will understand!) 1 university course, the list is endless!

So I have decided that for this assessment period, I am only going to submit ONE assessment – the Project Management module. The “final” module, which is actually module 1, the assessment we have (or should have(!)) been writing throughout the course, I am going to submit in October.

A few things have helped me come to this conclusion, not least the pain in my stomach! I cannot submit this assessment until all other assessments have been completed anyway, and whether I finish the course in July or October, the awards ceremony is only held once a year in May anyway – and after all this I have EVERY intention of attending that if at all possible! So it really makes very little difference to me whether I finish in July or October. I can honestly say hand on heart that I have been keeping the assessment up to date throughout the course, so it is pretty much already completed and will not take too much effort to finish off over the summer. I don’t think the module tutor will thank me too much when she sees the size of it mind!

So the next blog will see me hopefully celebrating after handing in the final module assessment which is due on July 29th. Nearly nearly there now! 


 

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